The present invention relates to a portable stairway for use with an airport boarding bridge. The stairway is portable, easily connects and disconnects from the boarding bridge and, while connected to the boarding bridge, moves freely with the boarding bridge as it is moved from location to location.
All modern airports utilize boarding bridges to facilitate loading and unloading passengers from large jet airplanes. A typical boarding bridge is connected to a gate in the airport terminal building and extends outward into the airplane parking area. These gates are usually located in the second level of the terminal--at approximately the same level as the door of a typical modern jet airliner. The boarding bridge is expandable, accordion-style, to extend out to the arriving or departing airplanes. The boarding bridge is also capable of pivoting through a radius to reach the various airplane parking positions serviced by its gate.
When passengers are about to enter or exit an airplane, the outer end of the boarding bridge is driven to a position contiguous to the door of the parked airplane. This may require some vertical adjustment of the end of the boarding bridge due to height variations from airplane to airplane, thus the end of the boarding bridge rides on a mechanism allowing it to be raised and lowered as needed. The end of the boarding bridge mates with the side of the airplane over the airplane door such that passengers may pass directly from one to the other without being exposed to the elements.
This method of entering and exiting airliners has become universal at larger airports and is very desirable. It keeps passengers protected from the weather, it prevents passengers from being exposed to the traffic and other dangers of the busy airplane parking level of the airport and airlines greatly prefer it from a customer-service point of view--it is much more comfortable, and comforting, to stroll down the corridor of a boarding bridge onto the airplane than to trudge across the asphalt of the airport parking level, exposed to the weather, and climb the airplane boarding stairs.
In recent years, airlines have increasingly made use of smaller, "regional" jet airplanes and propeller or "turbo-prop" airplanes to efficiently service shorter routes and to transport passengers from smaller airports to one of the airline's larger hub airports. These airplanes are smaller than the large jet airliners and their doors are much lower to the ground. Due to the size, height, and door and wing configuration of these smaller planes, the modern boarding bridge is incapable of servicing them directly. Passengers of such airplanes have long been forced to disembark onto the tarmac and walk to the terminal. Since the boarding bridges are of no use to these smaller airplanes, some airports have required such planes to park far from the terminal, requiring passengers to walk some distance or be carried to the terminal by shuttle bus. This situation is highly undesirable. In addition to being completely exposed to the weather, passengers traversing the airport parking ramp are exposed to such dangers as vehicular traffic, airplane propellers, jet engine intakes and tripping hazards.
Some partial solutions have been developed over the years. For example, a portable, expandable and covered walkway may be positioned next to an airplane to lead passengers along a protected path across the airplane parking ramp and into the terminal. This device prevents passengers from wandering into danger and protects them from the elements. However, such a device cannot be used with an airport's existing second-level gates and boarding bridges, and requires a completely different parking and loading configuration from that used for the large jets. Passengers are also required to climb terminal building steps into the terminal building.
Another partial solution consists of a gangplank-like device which allows a boarding bridge to interface with some regional planes. Unfortunately, due to the limited length of the gangplank and interference with the engines, this device works only with airplanes whose passenger doors are located behind the wings. This is not true of a majority of these types of airplanes.
Finally, some airports simply place a stairway in front of a boarding bridge and have passengers exit the airplane onto the airplane parking ramp, traverse the ramp and climb the stairs into the boarding bridge. This is an unsatisfactory solution as well. The stairways are not adapted to connect to the boarding bridge in any way and therefore can move or be misaligned creating tripping and falling hazards for the passengers. Also, the stairway must be moved separately and by hand whenever the boarding bridge is moved. This is extremely inconvenient as the boarding bridges are typically re-positioned for every plane. Other airports connect a stairway to the boarding bridge. However, this arrangement prevents movement of the boarding bridge to serve another airplane parking position.
For the foregoing reasons, there is a need for a portable stairway which may be easily connected to and disconnected from a boarding bridge, which will accommodate variations in the height of the boarding bridge and which, when connected to the boarding bridge, will move freely with the boarding bridge.